Trapped in Amber
by roberttb
Summary: Shepard relives the horrors of Akuze and Mindoir on a nightly bases.


Shepard loved grass on Mindoir. Its soft prickly nature, its soothing smell, how it changed colour as the seasons came and went. She envied how the grass used to outgrow her in August only for it to be cut down the following month. She wished she could grow as fast as the grass did.

_God I hate being small._ She thought to herself."Why mum? Just explain to me why?" she protested. Alex Shepard had been planning this for months; she needed to be tactful if anything. She hated being the youngest sibling. Each year the summers end festival would come and go and she would be left alone with no one else except her mother. _Josh and Chloe got to go when they were 16, why can't I? _

"Sweetie you need to lean to be patient" Her mother had always been caring. She was never overly nice or too strict; she had been very protective of her children. They were all she ever cared about and she wanted to give them the best opportunity that a poor family on a farming colony could provide. She was absolutely heartbroken when her husband was killed in the liberation of Shanxi. Alex was three when he died, she never got to meet her father. "You're always in such a rush to do things. It's like you rush away from me. I see you for half an hour when you eat and you don't say a word, even if you do you don't even make eye contact."

Shepard needed to be calm about this. They had been over this topic time and time again but no matter how Alex tried, she couldn't seem to show her remaining parent that she cared about her. "So wh- what exactly should I do mum?" she asked, her tone uneasy. The wounds of her previous arguments with her mother were still fresh, and this felt all too much like Déjà vu to her.

"A little conversation wouldn't hurt. I sometimes feel like you may be ignoring me, I'd be lying if I said it didn't make me a little upset." Her mother replied, eyes large and sad.

Alex took a deep breath. "I'm sorry if I have been making you feel that way, but what should we talk about mum?" She did her best to evaporate all the emotion from her voice so her words came out dry and strained.

There was a sharp pause.

"Anything sweetie" she replied softly and carefully.

"Yes… but like what?" letting her building frustration slip subtly into her voice.

"Like – like anything, just show me you care about me sweetie. It's like you're trying to make me feel bad."

_Oh so it's all my fault? _Those words were gasoline to the fire building up in her core; all her prepared calm logic and reasoning were thrown out the window and replaced by the stress that had been building up for days. "How have you showed me that you care about me, exactly? You lecture me about being kind and caring and considerate but you tell me this! How is that kind or caring or considerate?" She spat, her words slow and fuming. "You say you love me as much as Chloe, or Josh. But Chloe is going to study off world in a month and you are so _proud _of her, and you are so _proud _of Josh's to! You say you love us equally but that's bullshit!"

Alex had always been the rebellious one, still these words were like knifes in her mother's belly.

"Alex!"

She started shouting "You don't give a shit about how I feel! You never say you're _proud _of me. Why can't you just for once act as though you believe in me and I'm not the unwanted third chi-" Tears started to swell in her eyes as her voice cracked on the last word. "Why can't you just let me be your favorite daughter for one day?"

She stormed out before her mother could apologize.

She retreated back into the tall yellow grass underneath the shielding of an overhanging tree on a hill. She dug up her sketchbook and escaped into her own reality. She drew. Nothing specific, but whatever naturally came to her mind. The book was extremely thick, its dried leather coating showed signs of age and use. The surrounding grass soothed her and shielded her from the distractions of the outside world. She had retreated to this escape many times before, finding refuge in her isolation.

She was _so_ angry. She started to imagine what one of those aliens looked like. _The one's that killed my father. _She started drawing templates of what she saw from the pictures. When she was younger she hated these aliens for killing her father. She condemned them all because it was _their fault _she never met her father. As she got older her prejudice subsided but she still viewed these _Turians _with contempt. It wasn't long until someone started to look for her.

"Alex! Alex sweetie!" It was her mum. Her voice had notes of distress and was full of anguish. "Alex honey I'm sorry! It's not your fault, I was just being –"

Shepard hid herself behind the tree and covered her ears; she did not want to hear this right now. She peeked and saw the small figure of her mother wondering alone in the vast yellow field that surrounded her prefab. From here she could tell she had been crying.

She closed her hands tighter around her ears, eyes prickling with tears. _Just shut up! Please just shut up!_

The sun started to set, and the sky started to darken into a deep blue contrasting the bright yellow of the fields which was now starting to turn a sad orange.

She rummaged around the old leather bag she kept under her tree and pulled out a stuffed toy lion. _I'm way too old to be playing with toys. _The amber lion was ageing, its mane was untidy and there were visible tears from when it had been mistreated. The lion was beautifully handcrafted; it was made by her father for the daughter that he would end up never meeting.

For Shepard the toy marked several things. It reminded her of the sadness of losing the father she never had. Growing up she had dreamt about finally meeting the father that her mother and siblings always spoke about. She could still feel the disappointment and sadness the day that alliance soldier appeared at their door step. She could remember that she didn't see her mother at all that day; she only heard soft cries from her bedroom. However the lion also represented the father she knew nothing about, the father she loved even though she never met him. She always showed affection to it whilst her mother and siblings couldn't stand the sight of it. She called him Lionheart.

_KROWW KROW!_

Shepard jumped at the noise. She quickly placed Lionheart back into the bag as if someone would take him away from her. The black crows were out in numbers, silhouetted by the aging sun and forming large shadows across the fields. The atmosphere was oddly macabre.

She stayed under her tree until the milky stars were out, until the summer festival fireworks cracked overhead. The display drew her attentions for the time being, as the colours erupted across the night sky entrancing her, distracting her from the guilty pain that settled in her gut. This distant cheering of the crowd made her wonder what the rest of her family was doing, guilt stung in her belly. _Shit, I should apologize._ She sat there for a while, sketching the more elegant fireworks that rained a glistening gold across the settlement. Her sketch was interrupted by a sudden boom.

"That one was louder" she spoke out loud. "I must've missed that one" she concluded as she returned to her drawing.

Another explosion. Louder.

Alex looked up to see ship cutting across the sky as more explosions cracked in the distance.

_Those aren't fireworks_.

Patience. It almost made her laugh. The fire was still spreading. It had been spreading all night. It was almost dawn. The orange flames engulfing the town and countryside were slowly eating its way towards her prefab. Her home. _My Family_. The smoke burned her lungs and smelt of grief. The ambient sounds of gunshots echoed in the thin air. She heard screaming and shouting as distant figures ran to escape Batarian gunfire. Sometime during the night she heard Batarian voices coming towards her, she stayed patiently silent until the voices past. The hours she spent awake that night were amongst the longest in her life.

She waited. She cuddled Lionheart like it was her last comfort in the world, like it would protect her if the Batarians ever found her.

She waited until the sun started to rise; until she saw the last Batarians leave the vicinity of her home. _They had to have survived; I can't leave them like this! Not after… _She advanced towards her prefab, tucking Lionheart safety in her bag as and bringing him as well as all her belongings with her. The orange flames burning away at the settlement gave the morning sky a viscous liquid amber colour that stretched out to blanket the whole colony. The fire silhouetted the still present crows, their screeches softly echoing. The sight would've been breathtaking if it were not filled with death.

The short distance from her tree to her house seemed longer with each step. Each step welcomed uncertainty, uncertainty lead to speculation. Her mind was racing. They had to have made it out, she couldn't handle the '_what ifs_'. The crows still spoke their omnipotent _krowwes._

"Mum?" She spoke. She didn't see any Batarians near her house, she didn't care. "Chloe? Josh?"

_No. Please. _They had to have survived. They had to.

"Mum!" Her voice started to climb with panic. "Josh! Chloe!" panic and grief.

_Please. Please! Don't do this to me! I'm- I'm sorry._

"Mum!" She hastily entered her apartment.

_Please not like this, don't leave my like this. Not now._

She couldn't breathe.

She fell on her knees as the air in her lungs was viciously sucked out of her chest and her heart started pounding vigorously. Time slowed as she her brain tried to process the reality of the situation.

_No. This can't be happening. This isn't real. I'm dreaming._

She tried to talk, she couldn't. The unspoken words never left her mind, though still desperate to claw out. Her mother was pale on the floor, knife wounds in her belly. The blood was soaked into the carpet, boiling when it came in contact with fire. A black smoke was filling the room.

_I can breathe._

Tears streamed down her cheeks, she clawed her neck in a desperate attempt to wake up from this nightmare reality._ This isn't happening. _Blood was boiling, skin crackling.

_I'm sorry. It was my fault. _She tried to say, but her throat was as coarse as sandpaper. It was then she realized that she had been screaming.

"I'm sorry" she wailed. As if saying it would make her feel better, as if it would take back all the times she argued over such small and insignificant things.

The fire bathed Shepard in an amber hue as she knelt there trapped, unable to move.

_This was my fault._

"It is all my fault"

She couldn't move. She was trapped like an insect in amber resin. Unable to move. Unable to breath. Unable to escape.

_This was all my fault. _

She kept saying that in her head. Logic told her that it wasn't, but she ignored the voice and kept speaking.

"It's my fault."

Shepard wasn't on Mindoir anymore.

The sky seethed the same strange colours, but there was nothing on the surface but the lifeless dust that reflected the harsh colour of the cloudless sky.

Akuze was a stark contrast to the fertile lands of Mindoir. Still the colour brought back the stinging memory of the Batarian raid. She couldn't let that compromise her, she was a soldier now.

A leader

And this wasn't Mindoir.

_No. It was a hell of a lot worse. This time this really was my fault…_

"Form up! Form up!"

The remaining marines scrambled to a halt. Irons and Rohme supported Edington after his foot was consumed by the Thresher Maw's vile acid. Cofflin was still grieving after they lost Soraya in the last attack; the tears were still fresh on his face. As was the sweat and blood present on every soldier still alive. There wasn't much left of the ones that were dead. They had been sprinting for what seemed like endless hours, everyone was exhausted, breathless and hungry. They caught a break when they lost the Thresher Maws in the jagged valley. Their numbers, once fifty, were dwindling lower than twenty.

Akuze's sun sank low in the already glowing sky casting long shadows of their company across the dead landscape. "Where's Captain Macet?" Shepard demanded.

Toombs spoke "He was swallowed up when those bastards jumped us."

_Damn_

1st Lieutenant Cally was swallowed with the Mako when the Maws first appeared at camp. They lost sight of Lieutenant Commander Walker in the mad frenzy that had been the scramble out of the valley. The highest ranking officer was…

"Listen up!" Shepard commanded, the marines snapped to attention. "We have been on the move all day, we are all exhausted. But we need to keep moving if we are going to have any chance of getting off here alive. No one else is dying here today." She needed to get everyone off this rock alive. They were her responsibility now.

_And they will be my fault if they - _

"Excuse me! _Ma'am_" Irons interrupted mockingly. "Who the hell put you – "

"This is not the time _Private_. Cally, Walker and Macet are dead. That leaves me in charge. The one thing we know for sure is it's only a matter of time until those Maws return." Her voice was stern and commanding.

Usually when Shepard spoke, she peppered her conversations with her natural charisma. She was either adored for her occasional quick wit and her down to earth personality, or hated for her smart ass remarks and her ability to somehow always have a superior argument. But when she was sent to Elysium to lift the Batarian siege she found a new voice. A voice that was firm, to the point, quick, decisive. That was her leader voice.

"The alliance will come for us; we just need to hold on until they arrive." Shepard could be patient; she learnt that lesson not too long ago. "Our only chance we have is to split up into groups and –"

"Split up?" Yates protested. "Ma'am if we split up the Maws will pick us off!"

The crowd erupted in protests.

"We have a better chance if we stay together." Shouted North

Edington turned to look at him "Half of us don't have our weapons; some of us -" he gestured down to his own leg "-can't even walk!"

"This is stupid, we have a better chance if we –"

"ENOUGH!" Shepard's order cut though the chaos. "If we stick together the Maws will kill us in one short attack. Our only chance is to split up into groups giving the Maws more targets to go for."

"What if the Maws go for us and not say another group?" asked Walker.

Shepard thought briefly about her response before answering. "Then that's just a chance we all have to take."

There was a unanimous expression of disbelief as the marines turned to one another, looking for comfort and hope in what is a hopeless scenario.

"This is _screwed _up." whimpered Toombs. "This is seriously fucked up!"

Shepard needed to reassure them. "The alliance is coming. I swear that I will do everything I can to get all of you off this god-forsaken rock and back home." The thought of home seemed to calm some of them. _I don't have a home anymore._ "The situation is bleak. I won't lie to you, our chances are slim. But I'm sure as hell I want to live to see tomorrow. So driven by determination, or by strength, or by hope, or just by pure need to survive, I will live to see tomorrow. I don't know about the rest of you but I am getting the hell off this rock."

A little bit of hope and energy flickered across the crowed; she hoped this was a step in the right direction.

_Right, now all we have to do is deal with the Thresher Maws_

_Shit._

She slowly hurried across the barren surface, removing chunks of her amour that was defunct from the Maw's acid. She was so damn helpless when she saw the Thresher Maw devour the rest of her squad, she knew there wasn't a thing she could do except get herself killed.

So she ran, leaving them to die.

She moved herself into the cover of a small crevasse to catch her breath. If she ran any more she would pass out from exhaustion.

_Water_

She needed water. Akuze's sun was relentlessly beating down on her, she pull out her water canister but stopped when she saw it. The Maw's acid had melted into it, the water inside was lethal. She threw the remaining water onto the thirsty ground to remove the temptation of taking along drink.

"…wh- who's there?" a voice asked. The voice was weak, strained, dying.

Shepard swung around to be greeted to the sight of what remained of Edington lying face down in the orange dust. One of his arms was bent unnaturally. The acid eating away at his foot had dissolved the rest of his leg; if he hadn't spoken she would've thought he was dead already.

"Nate!" she exclaimed. Not Edington this time, her '_leader_' voice had dissolved with the rest of the people she was responsible for. She was now just down to earth terrified Shepard.

"Turn me around." he whimpered.

"What?"

"Turn me around so I'm facing up. I don't want to die with my face in the dirt." Nate's voice was crackling with desperation.

She did what he asked. Kneeling carefully as she did it cradling his body to make sure she didn't do any more harm. Nate breathed a sigh of relief when he saw the sky, but then sucked in a breath when he realised who his saviour was.

"What happened to Irons and Rohme? They were supposed to –"

"Irons and Rohme left me!" he interrupted. "The Maw attacked so they ditched me here to starve." His voice started to gurgle. He turned away from her and coughed a blood-soaked cough, spraying thick black blood away from her. "They were right, but they didn't make it very far."

Shepard was reminded of the guilt she felt when leaving Toombs instead of waiting for him at the mouth of the dried up river bed. She felt the tremors under where she was standing and felt that it was safer just to leave him.

"Ok, I'm going to get you out of here." She reassured Edington.

"How?"

"I'll- I'll carry you."

"If you try carrying me my guts will spill all over your shoes."

She looked down to examine the extent of his injuries. He wasn't going to make it. Even if an alliance shuttle broke the atmosphere right now to look for them, he wasn't going to live for very long.

"You said you would get us off this _god forsaken _rock!" he accused, his voice full of spite.

_I did, I failed._

"I still am." She didn't know if she was lying to him or herself, perhaps both.

"Don't give me that bullshit!" he spat, shaking. "Not now. Not while I'm like… like this."

There was a long silence as Shepard broke eye contact in a silent apology. She needed to get his mind off dying, just for the moment.

Fortunately he took care of that for her.

"I always wanted to be a chef." He said solemnly, his voice now calmer, his body more relaxed.

She huffed a nervous laugh. "Really?" she asked, genuinely curious. "Tell me about it."

He smiled as he relished the memory. "My mum worked in a restaurant; she made this beautiful lemon soufflé." His face lit up at the memory. "When I was younger I made drawing of restaurants I would own. But there was a twist." he said excitedly. "They were shaped like larger versions of the food they served."

Shepard smiled at the ridiculousness of a child's imagination.

_I had dreams like that too._

"You must've been such a nice kid" she said warmly. "I was a menace. When I was a kid I wanted to be a pirate." She though she even provoked a short laugh from him.

"Hah" he breathed, short and sharp. "I can imagine that." His smile faded as his thoughts trailed away. "My dad stopped that. He wanted me to be a marine. My uncle was killed in the first contact war so he wanted me to be a marine. He said that I wasn't a real man unless I joined up." He started laughing darkly "If only he could see me now." His laugh turned into a violent splutter.

She couldn't think of anything to say to comfort him.

He suddenly reached up with new found strength and grabbed a loose part of her armour and brought her close to his face so that she could smell the blood bubbling in his throat.

"Listen to me." He said with all his strength. "When you get out of here you find my father." _If I get out of here. _"And you tell him I died for a good cause." he paused. "Tell him I died a hero."

It was a lie and he knew it. Every death on Akuze had been a pointless death, a death without meaning, a death without consequence other than grief. She nodded in response, it was the least she could do.

"I will."

"And when you see him, give him this." He reached to his chest and presented a pair of dog tags. Not his, but his uncle's. She gave a silent nod and took them carefully.

She left him there, as she had left so many others.

Shepard knew that their chances of survival were slim. She never suspected that she would be the only one to make it out.

Those twenty lives on Akuze were her responsibility. She made them believe that she could get them out. They believed in her, and she had let them down, let them die.

She went to see Edington's father afterwards, and when she presented his brother's dog tags he broke down. Those dog tags were a reminder that he'd lost his only brother and his only son in service to the alliance. She told him that he died honourably and painlessly, she didn't tell him that he died a hero. _There were no heroes on Akuze, only victims. _He didn't accept the dog tag, so she kept it with her as a reminder of what happened on Akuze. _As if I need a reminder._

Anderson had told her that she did all she could, and that it was a miracle that she got out alive. His words were a cold comfort after all that had happened. Her councillors told her that she was remarkably strong, that she should have been driven mad by PTSD and sent to the alliance funny farm after what happened on Mindoir and Akuze. But somehow she wasn't, she was in control of herself. And now she had a galaxy to save for the second time.

Akuze should've broken her, but it didn't. After all those lives was her responsibility. _Edington, Samuels, Irons, Yates, Lewis, Walker, Cofflin, Atlee, Harper, Menendez, Papen,_ _Jin-Chan, Tarrance, Cassidy, Bates, Bland, North, Rohme and Toombs. _Forever trapped between the dead dust on Akuze and the frozen amber sky. She should be trapped there. Part of her still is, after all –

_They were my responsibility. My Fault._


End file.
